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Jun 9, 2022
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Back in Spring Break of this year when I was waiting for Poseidon’s Fury to open after a delay, there were 3 people next to me that work for Universal and they were having a conversation stating that Universal may bring anime experiences to either Epic Universe or Universal Studios Florida (Maybe both). But, they didn’t say what anime IP are they going to bring to the parks. Will it be themed to Demon Slayer, Beastars, My Hero Academia, or Naruto?
 
Kind of doubt it. They have anime experiences in Universal Studios Japan because it’s in, well, Japan. Then again I don’t really follow anime so I don’t know if these would boost the parks popularity in the US.
 
Anime is extreme popular in the USA. I don’t get why so many people still scream that it’s niche. It’s no longer 2004.

That's a bit of an overstatement. It has a very dedicated and active fan base...but that base is small.

Look at the Demon Slayer movie that came out 2 years ago and made about $500m world wide. HUGE hit. It only made like $50m in North America (US + Canada).

DreamWorks and Illumination movies all average about $300m in North America and about $1B world wide.

I'm just making up these numbers, but I think they're pretty accurate and illustrate my point. While people from around the world come to the park, it's predominantly Americans and they've spoken with their wallets about what they like.

I love Nine Inch Nails. They have a lot of fans. Every concert they have sells out rather quickly and their fan base is super dedicated. They release limited edition shirts and prints that sell out instantly at ridiculously high prices. Yet their last album sold less than half of what Ariana Grande's last album sold on its first day of release. Totally made up stat...but it illustrates my point that being within a fanbase gives you a distorted view of it's popularity and I'm not expecting NIN to get picked to do the Superbowl Halftime Show any time soon.
 
Anime is extreme popular in the USA. I don’t get why so many people still scream that it’s niche. It’s no longer 2004.

Anime has grown considerably with the market blowing up in accessibility and presence over the past decade, with groups like Crunchyroll, Funimation, Netflix/Hulu, and Hi-Dive making it much more of an easier ability to get into contact. But the specific IP's and shows? That's where you need to get technical.

Hello Kitty is Japanese Animation (or as people would simplify: Anime). She's already at UOR with other Sanrio characters. That doesn't exactly mean she's going to replace Lord Darkenon. There are really only a few handful that would make potential sense, but even then; I'd imagine NBCUniversal would want to test those IP's in the North America's directly before doing anything serious.

Pokemon's probably going to be the only "big" piece of Japanese material that UC for North America would be heavily work using the Animation assets, but even then that's not the bulk of the franchise. I do wonder on My Hero Academia; and I'm intently looking at what Legendary does with the IP as I can see that working well for NA. One Piece from Netflix too to an extent. But I don't think it's as simple as people would like it to be.

The only outlier could be Demon Slayer, but that really depends on how things go forward for the franchise following their next eventual movie, if lightning can strike twice. And of-course, Dragon Ball being what it is. But that's..4 IP's? Not counting Pokemon, and not counting other Nintendo properties like Zelda.

Look at the Demon Slayer movie that came out 2 years ago and made about $500m world wide. HUGE hit. It only made like $50m in North America (US + Canada).

Demon Slayer was the first time that an japanese broke the all time box office record for a Japanese animated movie globally since Spirited Away. It's one of the biggest abnormalities of the pandemic, and I don't think it'd be easy to sleep on the amount of money it earned overall. Not just NA.
 
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Demon Slayer was the first time that an japanese broke the all time box office record for a Japanese animated movie globally since Spirited Away. It's one of the biggest abnormalities of the pandemic, and I don't think it'd be easy to sleep on the amount of money it earned overall. Not just NA.

Thank you for reinforcing my case. It's one movie and was a ginourmous hit which was an anomaly.

I compared the best of Anime to the average US tent pole animation. Didn't compare it to Shrek 2 which made over $400m in NA or anything like that.

Anime, in terms of movies, does not move the needle in America. I'm sorry, but that's true. Every mall in America has that weird shop that sells Funkos and Anime stuff so that might seem pervasive, but it really isn't. The one at my local mall is literally in between a piano store and a native American decor/crafts shop and if I see more than 2 customers in there it looks busy. It doesn't even open with the mall, it opens at noon.

Here's a list of the top grossing Anime movies in US history. If you add them all up, the top 100 Anime films, it's probably in the ball park of what Shrek 2 made alone.

Top US Grossing Anime

Not trying to pick fights, just want to illustrate that in the US, Anime doesn't make sense for a park whose own animation IP makes a factorial more money per film and doesn't require paying any licensing/royalties fees. And the parks #1 goal is to make money by giving consumers what they want and what they're willing to spend their dollars on.
 
'Very Niche', in the USA, Anime....no way as an attraction in the parks. Too many other IP's, that are general public oriented, in front of the niche anime.....Anime's best chance is something low level, like
an Escape Room or a snack/merch stand at CitiWalk.....Not only is anime niche in the USA, most people in the general public don't even know what the hell it is if you asked someone on the street.
 
Thank you for reinforcing my case. It's one movie and was a ginourmous hit which was an anomaly.

I compared the best of Anime to the average US tent pole animation. Didn't compare it to Shrek 2 which made over $400m in NA or anything like that.

Anime, in terms of movies, does not move the needle in America. I'm sorry, but that's true. Every mall in America has that weird shop that sells Funkos and Anime stuff so that might seem pervasive, but it really isn't. The one at my local mall is literally in between a piano store and a native American decor/crafts shop and if I see more than 2 customers in there it looks busy. It doesn't even open with the mall, it opens at noon.

Here's a list of the top grossing Anime movies in US history. If you add them all up, the top 100 Anime films, it's probably in the ball park of what Shrek 2 made alone.

Top US Grossing Anime

Not trying to pick fights, just want to illustrate that in the US, Anime doesn't make sense for a park whose own animation IP makes a factorial more money per film and doesn't require paying any licensing/royalties fees. And the parks #1 goal is to make money by giving consumers what they want and what they're willing to spend their dollars on.

We simplify things to this IP makes a lot of money not realizing film is the only medium to measure an IPs value. Film justifies the audience but doesn't measure the passion of the audience. That is through merchandise sales. Which is where theme parks make a boatload of money more so than ticket sales. Going back to merch sales...that is where anime properties shine to the level of Potter and more. That's why the argument that anime is niche isn't a strong one when the top merch selling brands outside Disney, Potter, and minions typically are anime based.

However, I do get the fact that anime is broad term and not down to specific properties which is a decent argument as then it can be said that oh Sailor Moon only caters to this population, Dragon Ball Z is only popular with this circle, what about One Piece, etc. However, lets also look at the facts one of the longest lasting and most popular Universal attractions at all the parks beside Orlando was based on a movie that was considered Universal's worst flop yet guest love it a lot known as Waterworld.
 
However, lets also look at the facts one of the longest lasting and most popular Universal attractions at all the parks beside Orlando was based on a movie that was considered Universal's worst flop yet guest love it a lot known as Waterworld.

Well in fairness Waterworld is a Uni owned property.
 
@Neo
I don’t think measuring anime by using theater releases is the correct way to do so. It would be better to judge by merch sales and streaming views. You say that it’s just those weird little kiosks but you can go to any Walmart or Target and find loads of stuff. It’s everywhere at this point.
 
@Neo
I don’t think measuring anime by using theater releases is the correct way to do so. It would be better to judge by merch sales and streaming views. You say that it’s just those weird little kiosks but you can go to any Walmart or Target and find loads of stuff. It’s everywhere at this point.

OK, so Universal is where you go to "ride the movies" so yes, I'm using movies as a basis.

But for the sake of discussion (don't want to say argument) let's talk about your specific example of Target since I regularly visit 3 different ones by me.

Each one has a section, on the back wall by electronics that has horror figures, some Funkos, weird stuffed animals, and some Anime stuff (figures, Funkos, shirts in boxes, keychains, pins, etc). I'd say this section is about 20 feet wide.

The toy section is huge, like 10 isles, and it has a bunch of Jurassic World, Stranger Things, South Park, Simpsons and other popular Funkos. It also has an entire aisle, both sides, for Jurassic World Dominion right now. When the new Minions movie comes out, it will have an entire isle dedicated to it. Plus stuff randomly peppered through the store and by checkouts. Minions band aids make end cap displays in the healthcare section, Mandalorian branded goldfish and Stranger Things Doritos get displays in the food section. Up front by the checkouts they have trading cards and random "mystery packs" of minions and other IP.

Why are the Anime toys not in the toy section? (Granted Bakugon stuff is). Why are their shirts not in the clothing section? Why aren't any little things like pins up by the trading cards/collectibles? Why is their stuff all concentrated in a 20' section on the backmost wall of the store behind the obsolete (due to ebooks) book section?

Because it's niche.

Again, supply and demand and the resulting advertising based on sales. If the stuff sold really well, it would be in the high traffic areas. 60sqft on the back wall of a 100,000sqft big box store doesn't equal huge popularity. In fact, the section usually spans about 2 aisles and the endcaps opposite of it at 2 out of the 3 Targets (the third has $10 blu-ray deals) is the clearance section. The least valuable and desired stuff in the store is in the same area for 67% of my local stores.

A lot of people love it, a lot of critics hail the movies and give them great reviews, but sorry...the general public, by and large, doesn't care.

A themepark has to appeal to the masses to be profitable, much like Target had to be profitable so there is no business case for putting Anime stuff in prime locations using up valuable square footage.
 
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These alternative stories of huge stocks of fast selling Anime merchandise in major USA mainline retail stores only exists in some Bizarro World. Anime in USA is niche, niche, niche. This is the USA, not Japan. An Anime attraction
has as much chance to be built in Universal Orlando as the Pittsburgh Pirates have of winning the 2022 World Series. I don't understand why this rumor keeps popping up these past few months :doh: .
 
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